Help! I’ve got Windows 8 and I miss my Start menu!

We take a look at some of the Start menu alternatives for Windows 8.

With Christmas now long behind us, one or two of you may well have been lucky enough to find a shiny new Windows 8 PC under the tree. After cleaning off the crapware, it's time to use the thing, and that means digging into the new user interface.

The Windows 8 user interface has many Windows users divided. The chief complaints are that Windows 8 has no Start button and that it has no Start menu, only the (full-screen, Metro-styled) Start screen. Secondary to these is the complaint that Windows 8 shows the Start screen immediately after logging in, rather than showing the desktop as prior versions of Windows have done. Getting to the desktop takes an extra click.

To address the unfamiliarity and (perceived) problems with the Windows 8 UI, a number of third-party applications have popped up to provide a Start menu, or some approximation thereof, and a Start button for Windows 8 users. They also pull some kind of trickery to switch directly to the desktop upon logging in.

Some of these applications are new, motivated entirely by Windows 8's supposed "shortcomings"—Stardock's Start8, StartIsBack, and RetroUI all share this characteristic. Others are new versions of old apps. Classic Shell was originally a project to reinstate the Windows XP Start menu on Windows Vista and Windows 7 (among other things); it now has some Windows 8-specific functionality. Pokki is an application runtime, launcher, and marketplace; in its latest iteration it too jumps on the Start screen replacement bandwagon.

If you can't stomach the lack of menu and button in Windows 8 or just don't fancy the support and training overheads that come from rolling out a new user interface to users familiar with Windows 7 or older, one of these apps might be the ideal solution.

StartIsBack

Enlarge/ StartIsBack in action. Imperceptibly different from the Windows 7 original.

When it comes to providing an authentic Start-like experience, the clear winner is StartIsBack. The StartIsBack Start button and menu look all but identical to their Windows 7 versions. The developer claims that although the Start menu isn't accessible in Windows 8, Microsoft had to leave most of the implementation and plumbing in the operating system for backwards compatibility reasons. StartIsBack taps into these hidden capabilities to provide a Start menu experience that will be immediately familiar to anyone who has used prior versions of Windows. It has the right look (down to the glowing hover effect when the mouse cursor is over the Start button) and offers the same features, including integrated search and highlighting of newly installed applications.

The range of options and settings for StartIsBack is similarly authentic, although the layout of those options is not.

Enlarge/ StartIsBack takes the traditional Windows 7 Start menu settings and sticks them in a window.

On top of this genuine Start menu experience, StartIsBack provides some control over Windows 8 features. Logging in direct to the desktop is the most important for those wanting to turn Windows 8 into Windows 7, and StartIsBack duly provides that option. Beyond that, StartIsBack allows you to disable the hot corners. With StartIsBack you can still have access to the Start screen if you want; you can also elect to remove all desktop apps from the Start screen, making it a launcher solely for Metro-style apps.

Metro does still poke through occasionally. The Win+Tab combination still invokes the new Metro app switcher rather than Flip3D. Similarly, Win+F takes you to the new Metro search screen rather than an Explorer search window. StartIsBack also doesn't do anything to reinstate desktop functionality for things that have been moved into the Metro universe; clicking your network connection still shows a Metro-esque panel, adding a Bluetooth device still takes you to the Metro Settings app, and so on. Nonetheless, this is the best Windows 7 workalike if that's what you're after.

Metro poking through here and there is a common feature of all these applications. If you simply can't abide by seeing any aspects of the Metro interface on your desktop PC, none of these applications will make Windows 8 good enough for your preferences.

Licenses for StartIsBack start from $3 per PC, with a free 30-day trial. The app can be installed and used as a regular unprivileged user. When running, it doesn't even create any extra processes; it just loads an extra DLL into the Explorer process that Windows always runs anyway.

Start8

Another near-exact clone of the Start menu is found with Stardock's Start8. I haven't poked around too deeply in the internals of this app, but from the look and feel of it, it's using the same technique as StartIsBack. Namely, it takes Windows' own remnants of legacy Start menu code to provide an authentic-looking, fully functional Start menu. There are some minor differences: Start8 includes a special Start menu entry that opens the Start screen, and it has a small glitch in its shutdown menu, but aside from that, there's nothing to choose between them.

Enlarge/ Start8's shutdown menu has a small glitch; the empty section at the bottom. Surprisingly, the otherwise identical StartIsBack doesn't appear to have the same problem.

Like StartIsBack, Start8 also includes selective disabling of hot corners, booting straight to the desktop, and other similar options. It does, however, have one trick up its sleeve that StartIsBack lacks. Instead of showing a regular Start menu, you can tell Start8 to instead show a Windows8-style menu. To do this, StartDock has simply placed the Start screen inside a borderless window on the desktop. The Start screen retains all its functionality, such as the options in the settings charm and the app bar that appears when you right click. It just occupies a fraction of the screen rather than the whole thing.

Enlarge/ Start8 lets you use the Start screen in a sort of window. If the Start screen were designed for portrait mode, this might work well. It isn't, and it doesn't.

The appeal of this isn't really clear to me. I could see how some derivative of this idea might work nicely enough, if you tightened up the spacing and scrolled vertically rather than horizontally (in other words, if you adapted the Start screen to fit into a roughly Start menu-sized area), but as things stand it's the worst of all worlds.

Start8 pricing starts at $4.99 per PC. I can't really see the appeal. If a Windows 7 Start menu is what you want, StartIsBack offers the same for less money. Start8's additional Start-screen-in-a-box menu doesn't add much value as things currently stand.

Start8 is also a whole lot less convenient. It requires Administrator rights to install and creates a system service. There appears to be no good way of restricting it to certain users, and if you want to use it on someone else's machine (for example, if you want a Start menu on a Windows 8-equipped corporate desktop) then you're out of luck.

Classic Shell

If the Windows 7 Start menu isn't to your taste, you might want to check out Classic Shell. Classic Shell strives to provide something altogether more old-school. Although it does have a Windows Vista/Windows 7-style menu, its raison d'être is harking back to yesteryear, with both a single column (Windows 2000-style) and dual column non-searchable (Windows XP-style) menu on offer. Unlike StartIsBack, which leverages Windows' own code to draw its menus, Classic Shell undertakes to perform all the drawing and layout itself. As a result, none of its menu options look quite right. They're immediately recognizable as knock-offs.

Enlarge/ Classic Shell's big virtue is that you can go right back in time to a Windows 2000-style menu, if you really want to.

I found this unfulfilled aspiration annoying to use. Nothing works the way it should, nothing looks the way it should. Personally, I would rather have an app that implemented its own concepts well, rather than poorly imitating someone else's concepts.

Classic Shell is also strongly influenced by the idiosyncrasies of its developer. Even when using a Windows Vista/Windows 7-style menu, the Programs folder is a conventional fly-out menu (as it was in Windows XP and below) rather than the weird in-line contraption that the newer operating systems use. It also has a second fly-out menu for Metro apps. If one prefers the fly-out menus, this is fine; if one wants the menu to simply behave like it did in Windows 7, it isn't. Similarly, although the Classic Shell menu has a search box, it doesn't work like its corresponding Windows 7 feature; it can only search the menu and system path. The Windows 7 search feature can be configured to search the entire machine, using the operating system's built-in content indexing.

Classic Shell has a couple of Windows 8-specific features; it can boot straight to the desktop and disable hot corners. It offers less fine-tuning here than StartIsBack. That program allows hot corners to be disabled individually; Classic Shell allows you to disable all of them, or just the bottom left (the hot corner that normally brings up the Start screen).

Enlarge/ Classic Shell has many, many settings spread across a multitude of tabs.

In addition to the Start menu workalike, Classic Shell also (optionally) adds toolbars to Internet Explorer and Explorer to reinstate or provide easier access to certain features. For example, the Explorer add-ons will replace the "conflict" dialog boxes when copying files with identical names with older versions and add a toolbar with cut, copy, and paste buttons. The Internet Explorer add-ons didn't appear to do anything in Internet Explorer 10 (perhaps unsurprising, as they're intended for Internet Explorer 9). The Explorer additions similarly seemed superfluous (at best) or unwanted (at worst). They're also ugly, as they fail to match the prevailing styling of the operating system.

Classic Shell's installation system is annoying. Technically, it works just fine when run as a regular app; it doesn't need Administrator rights or anything like that. However, just as with Start8, the installer requires Administrator rights and installs a system service. Allegedly this service is required to ensure that Classic Shell starts up quickly and can properly enable booting directly to the desktop (rather than to the Start screen). However, StartIsBack thoroughly debunks the notion that you need a service to do this, given that it boots straight to desktop with no service necessary.

Classic Shell is zero cost and open source. If you want an actual Windows 7 Start menu, skip Classic Shell. StartIsBack and Start8 both do the job much better. If you really hark back for the Windows XP Start menu, then Classic Shell is probably your best bet, but I'd have to wonder why anyone would want to give up search directly from the Start menu.

485 Reader Comments

Ah, another article singing the praises of the Windows "Search/Run" bar.

I guess no one ever has installed Libreoffice and typed "Calc", hit enter, and gotten something entirely different from the Windows Calculator, or tried searching for that app, you know, the one that mounts .ISO files. Um.. I'm sure the Search feature could help me as soon as I remember the name of the app...

Nah. I'll just go to "All Programs". As soon as I see it I'll remember the name.

and going to the new Windows 8 all programs will allow you to find that app name you can't remember by showing you all of your apps and installed support files nice and organized by program name and alphabetically.

vs. The Windows 95 where you click All Programs and see one and a half columns of programs that are small and difficult to see/discern from one another and then you need to barrel down the menu further to click on the program you want to run.

choose your poison, but Window's 8's new All Programs screen is much easier for me than the old way of doing things.

plus, what's stopping you from "pinning" those apps in the All Programs Screen to your Start Screen or Task Bar? - sounds like a no brainer!

Windows 7, problem resolved. If you are missing your Start Menu why are you rewarding Microsoft for building such an asinine OS for a desktop / laptop. Either man up and deal with it, or don't use it. The problem is your average consumer wants it all and will throw a hissy fit if they don't get it. Welcome to choices in life.

Couldn't agree more. Whole lot of me-titlement goes on when it comes to W8.

I get that some people don't like changes. But let's not make it sound like the new UI is inherently counter productive. It's not.

The new UI is inherently counter productive, especially if you don't change the default file associations. The experience of being thrown unexpectedly into a full-screen Metro App just because you clicked on a JPEG in an Explorer folder somewhere is certainly counter-productive to my purposes and my workflow. But that was intentional on Microsoft's part; it serves their purposes to jarringly switch my context and watch me crawl back to civilization as best as I can. I am not being helped by this involuntary immersion in a new GUI paradigm that is best suited to 10" tablets.

I installed Start8 as it seemed to integrate nicely with the colour scheme and was much less obviously a third party program. I don't think my parents are even aware of the new Metro UI except for perhaps the log in screen. If I can get two retired individuals using Windows 8 without complaint then it can't be that much of a shock.

Once you have installed all your usual desktop apps e.g. Adobe Reader, Office and made sure those are default (usually an option during install) it is plain sailing. For the guy who didn't like full screen media player, the desktop one is still there. Right click a media file in explorer and the options for the programs to use should be there.

I run Windows 8 on an Ion netbook and it runs really smoothly apart from the odd stutter when there is a folder with a lot of files. Windows installed all the drivers with a little bit of glitching from the graphics at first, but it fixed after the first reboot. The system boots in about 20 seconds even on a mechanical drive. I use it to watch movies, surf the web and a bit of Spotify. Light games like Machinarium or Cut the Rope are very playable. Internet Explorer seems to be the smoothest browser as others don't hardware accelerate on ion.

I only use Metro apps as experiments but once you work out the hot corners, multitasking becomes simple, if only for the case where the user needs only a few apps at a time. So far the apps have been a very mixed bag. There are some ones that work very well like EBay or Netflix. Others seem just to be layouts for familiar sites like Facebook. I've always felt that apps are mostly a con though. Instead of using the web, people are tricked into thinking they need apps to do things, locking them in to expensive hardware or contracts.

plus, what's stopping you from "pinning" those apps in the All Programs Screen to your Start Screen or Task Bar? - sounds like a no brainer!

How many programs can you Pin? 10? 25? 50? I don't use the Win7 Start Bar because it doesn't scale well. In fact, the new Modern start screen doesn't even scale that well compared to how many shortcuts you can get on even a 1600x1050 Desktop...

I don't see a need. The start menu is just full screen now and it is in the same location it has always been. The only difference is with the new UI you finally have multiple work spaces like Linux has had for years. This is a step in the wrong direction - backwards.

Not to mention your start screen has a giant button that says, "Desktop" for those unwilling to spend 10 seconds getting use to the hot corners.

I agree. But I have noticed that there's a certain segment of population that just like to whine and waste time looking for PC problems to solve. Doesn't matter that they can learn the new UI in minutes, they must spend hours tweaking their PC to satisfy themselves. It's their pastime.

Show me how to lock the Modern interface to one screen of my multi-monitor desktop, in that case.

plus, what's stopping you from "pinning" those apps in the All Programs Screen to your Start Screen or Task Bar? - sounds like a no brainer!

How many programs can you Pin? 10? 25? 50? I don't use the Win7 Start Bar because it doesn't scale well. In fact, the new Modern start screen doesn't even scale that well compared to how many shortcuts you can get on even a 1600x1050 Desktop...

I won't deny that Windows 7 might be more amenable to your use-case...

...but how many users do you believe are like you?

I mean, the idea that you have so many programs that you can't fit them all on the Start Screen + taskbar combined, but you also use these programs so infrequently that you can't remember their names...anyone who believes that this is an average scenario is off-kilter, in my book. Of course, if this DOES describe you, it makes total sense to want a heirachy-based system. You can do this with outside programs (or you can use the toolbar tip I posted earlier). So plenty of people can say "Windows 8 is worse for my own use". Too many people though, make their commentary universal and say "Windows 8 is universally worse", which is not a logical connection. (Now I'm not saying this applies to you, you may not have done this- it's a general comment).

For the "average" user, things like multi-monitor support will never be seen. What WILL be seen is faster app discovery and consistancy. That it doesn't work for everyone is understandable. No UI is universally usable.

Speaking only for desktop users (tablets and phones have a different user model) it appears that your dream would satisfy the vast majority of users. I believe you could reach 100% of them with a slightly different menu (again, for desktop and large laptop users):

1. Same UI as Windows7 (Classic)2. Same UI as Tablets and Phones (Metro)3. A unique blend of Classic and Metro.

Windows8 and WindowsRT applications share a large swath of the Classic Win32 APIs. However, they are different enough to be incompatible. How to reconcile them in a Classic/Metro blend?

I will be oversimplifying here but basically RT apps don't know anything about windows; they know about surfaces that render over DXGI (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DXGI). I don't think it would create a lot of extra work to run RT apps on a surface render target for DirectX11. W8 and RT use exactly the same kernel, drivers and DirectX. That could be accomplished without a major OS rewrite.

The only reason I can think Microsoft did not provide the "blend" option is that they would rather have users move to the uniform, universal Metro interface. It makes Microsoft's life simpler but as you can see from the comments above, it is not going to work for a large percentage of users.

Why alienate those users when you could give them the best of both worlds?

The desktop is a sufficiently different device from the phones. It makes sense to provide a sufficiently different user interface. Metro is wonderful for phones and some folks like it on the desktop. However a sizeable percentage of them do not.

Likewise. The PocketPC experiment demonstrated that users hated the classic UI on phones. W8P users are happy with Metro.

Microsoft has a history of pushing something that doesn't quite work and fix it in a later release. I hope Windows9 makes users' life easier for those who were perfectly content with Windows 7 while still promoting RT and Metro. The "blend" option presented here would accomplish that.

By the way, why cant you re-size tiles for non metro apps? Why doesn't a right click let you kill a metro app?

Right-clicking doesn't let you close the app because Microsoft is managing the resources for it. It's like a phone. You don't need to close apps manually in most cases. The OS is smarter about resource management. I'd imagine that in most cases a big "x" on right click isn't possible because right-click is also the same as swiping up from the bottom for tablets. Just like phone and tablet apps, it's too easy to hit accidentally. If you want to close a metro app manually, just move the mouse to the top, click and drag the program to the bottom. In most cases though, the system is going to close background programs as resources demand. It's an unnecessary thing for most people, even if we're used to it on desktops.

From the Start Screen swipe your mouse to the left edge. Right click on the icon of the running Metro App. The only option is Close. No idea where the original poster was right-clicking to try and close it (the tile I guess).

So yes, Win 8 manages the resources and will close them for you, but it's pitifully easy to close them manually if you want/need to.

From the Start Screen swipe your mouse to the left edge. Right click on the icon of the running Metro App. The only option is Close. No idea where the original poster was right-clicking to try and close it (the tile I guess).

So yes, Win 8 manages the resources and will close them for you, but it's pitifully easy to close them manually if you want/need to.

Harmless to add the feature to do this (you still can't force-quit in WP8, so it's hardly ubiquitous in Microsoft operating systems ) and can you imagine the rage if you just couldn't close those apps manually? The decision to add that was certainly the right one for all kinds of reasons.

From the Start Screen swipe your mouse to the left edge. Right click on the icon of the running Metro App. The only option is Close. No idea where the original poster was right-clicking to try and close it (the tile I guess).

So yes, Win 8 manages the resources and will close them for you, but it's pitifully easy to close them manually if you want/need to.

I didn't even know about that one. As always, it seems Microsoft has redundant ways of doing things. I'm so used to the idea of just letting the system do its own work now that I don't bother finding new ways to close it. I'm away from my Win 8 box ATM. Anyone want to check Shift+Alt+F4 or Ctrl+F4 or Ctrl+W (the old Windows "close current Window" commands) to see if they work?

I don't see a need. The start menu is just full screen now and it is in the same location it has always been. The only difference is with the new UI you finally have multiple work spaces like Linux has had for years. This is a step in the wrong direction - backwards.

Not to mention your start screen has a giant button that says, "Desktop" for those unwilling to spend 10 seconds getting use to the hot corners.

I agree. But I have noticed that there's a certain segment of population that just like to whine and waste time looking for PC problems to solve. Doesn't matter that they can learn the new UI in minutes, they must spend hours tweaking their PC to satisfy themselves. It's their pastime.

Show me how to lock the Modern interface to one screen of my multi-monitor desktop, in that case.

Harmless to add the feature to do this (you still can't force-quit in WP8, so it's hardly ubiquitous in Microsoft operating systems ) and can you imagine the rage if you just couldn't close those apps manually? The decision to add that was certainly the right one for all kinds of reasons.

Click at the top of the screen (in the middle) on any metro app and drag it to the bottom to close it. I've never seen a metro app hang so bad that it can't be closed that way. You also have the desktop task manager as backup.

I get that some people don't like changes. But let's not make it sound like the new UI is inherently counter productive. It's not.

The new UI is inherently counter productive, especially if you don't change the default file associations. The experience of being thrown unexpectedly into a full-screen Metro App just because you clicked on a JPEG in an Explorer folder somewhere is certainly counter-productive to my purposes and my workflow. But that was intentional on Microsoft's part; it serves their purposes to jarringly switch my context and watch me crawl back to civilization as best as I can. I am not being helped by this involuntary immersion in a new GUI paradigm that is best suited to 10" tablets.

Default Programs

type this into your Start Screen, search will appear and you will see that Default Programs is listed both under apps and utilities.

Change this setting and you can use your desktop apps. There is no need to "bash" metro/modern for your inability to change the default programs which is so easily done.

I get that some people don't like changes. But let's not make it sound like the new UI is inherently counter productive. It's not.

The new UI is inherently counter productive, especially if you don't change the default file associations. The experience of being thrown unexpectedly into a full-screen Metro App just because you clicked on a JPEG in an Explorer folder somewhere is certainly counter-productive to my purposes and my workflow. But that was intentional on Microsoft's part; it serves their purposes to jarringly switch my context and watch me crawl back to civilization as best as I can. I am not being helped by this involuntary immersion in a new GUI paradigm that is best suited to 10" tablets.

This is absolutely true. I spent about twenty minutes going through the file associations. All the old Windows choices are still there if you used them (Media Player for Video or Music, Picture Viewer for images etc) and they do pop up as options when you click a file type to change it. It was a bit tedious, but only has to be done once. I haven't been sent back to a Metro App since.

If you used third-party programs for such things it should change the file associations when you re-install them.

From the Start Screen swipe your mouse to the left edge. Right click on the icon of the running Metro App. The only option is Close. No idea where the original poster was right-clicking to try and close it (the tile I guess).

So yes, Win 8 manages the resources and will close them for you, but it's pitifully easy to close them manually if you want/need to.

I didn't even know about that one. As always, it seems Microsoft has redundant ways of doing things. I'm so used to the idea of just letting the system do its own work now that I don't bother finding new ways to close it. I'm away from my Win 8 box ATM. Anyone want to check Shift+Alt+F4 or Ctrl+F4 or Ctrl+W (the old Windows "close current Window" commands) to see if they work?

The tablet-centric way of doing things works, too. You can try it with your mouse if you want.

With the app open: drag from the very top edge of the screen to the very bottom edge of the screen.

With the app backgrounded: Swipe from the left and back to open the list of apps, and then drag the image for the app you want to close out to the middle, and then to the bottom edge of the screen. Or, if it's the last app, simply drag from the left bezel to the middle, and then down to the bottom edge.

It's sort of like "throwing" the app away. I like it (at least on my ultrabook/tablet, of course).

From the Start Screen swipe your mouse to the left edge. Right click on the icon of the running Metro App. The only option is Close. No idea where the original poster was right-clicking to try and close it (the tile I guess).

So yes, Win 8 manages the resources and will close them for you, but it's pitifully easy to close them manually if you want/need to.

I didn't even know about that one. As always, it seems Microsoft has redundant ways of doing things. I'm so used to the idea of just letting the system do its own work now that I don't bother finding new ways to close it. I'm away from my Win 8 box ATM. Anyone want to check Shift+Alt+F4 or Ctrl+F4 or Ctrl+W (the old Windows "close current Window" commands) to see if they work?

Yep, just tried it. ALT-F4 closes it as well. Hadn't thought to try that, also someone mentioned below, simply dragging the top of the app downward closes it as well. So there are multiple ways to do it quite easily.

From the Start Screen swipe your mouse to the left edge. Right click on the icon of the running Metro App. The only option is Close. No idea where the original poster was right-clicking to try and close it (the tile I guess).

So yes, Win 8 manages the resources and will close them for you, but it's pitifully easy to close them manually if you want/need to.

Harmless to add the feature to do this (you still can't force-quit in WP8, so it's hardly ubiquitous in Microsoft operating systems ) and can you imagine the rage if you just couldn't close those apps manually? The decision to add that was certainly the right one for all kinds of reasons.

Force-quite in WP8? What????

Are you referring to closing an app running on Windows Phone 8? It's super simple to do and was introduced along with Windows Phone 7.5 a full uear ago.

Hold down the back button to bring up your background apps. Select the app you wish to close. press the back button until you exit the app. When you long press the back button that app will no longer be running and will not included in your background tasks.

this is basic stuff that I wish people would take the time to learn and not continue to repeat over and over again how Windows Phone "can't do xyz" when the fact is, there are many advanced features in Windows Phone and now even more in Windows Phone 8 that users just don't know about because they know how to do it on Android or iPhone, the fact is, these features are there and only for the advanced user, which you and many other are not -- not yet anyway.

I don't see a need. The start menu is just full screen now and it is in the same location it has always been. The only difference is with the new UI you finally have multiple work spaces like Linux has had for years. This is a step in the wrong direction - backwards.

Not to mention your start screen has a giant button that says, "Desktop" for those unwilling to spend 10 seconds getting use to the hot corners.

I agree. But I have noticed that there's a certain segment of population that just like to whine and waste time looking for PC problems to solve. Doesn't matter that they can learn the new UI in minutes, they must spend hours tweaking their PC to satisfy themselves. It's their pastime.

Show me how to lock the Modern interface to one screen of my multi-monitor desktop, in that case.

Windows Key + PgUp or PgDown

Not really sufficient. That might move the screen if it's open, but it's still just a Band-Aid over the real problem: Windows remembers the last display that whatever Metro app you had open was on. Next time you hit the Windows key, the Start Screen pops up on that display. A simple option that tells Windows "Always open the Start Screen on display #1" would make things so much less irritating whenever you open Start.

Many thanks for the reviews. Being told not to update to Windows 8 and miss out on its core updates and fundamental OS improvements because of an arbitrary Ui change is very disheartening. It is good to see that there are reasonable options available to bring back functionality while still gaining the improvements behind Windows 8. I will more strongly consider an upgrade with these options.

Honestly, it's just not as bad as people are making it out to be.

Remember the Start Button? Place your cursor there, then just move a few more pixels to the corner. See the button pop up? Click it. Voila, Start Screen!

I upgraded just a few days ago in spite of all the hoopla and I find it very easy to use after just a few hours of playing around with it. Start by just using the Start Screen as a replacement Start Menu, then slowly delve into the Metro type stuff. Learn the swiping moves on the left hand side of the screen to quickly change between apps (again, much easier with a mouse than people make it out to be, I have no touch screen) and suddenly all the weirdness is gone and you realize that the Start Screen actually IS the Start Menu in a full-page format. It becomes second-nature very quickly.

As for the article, it's not at all surprising that one developer says all the guts of the Start Menu are still there. Just hit win + x from the desktop (I think MS calls it the 'Power User Menu'.) Look familiar?

I use the start menu very rarely. My primary use is for system tools. I run almost everything else off the desktop. I like my start menu small and uncluttered. By definition the Star Screen violates the very essence of how I use the Start Menu. And by booting into the Star Screen with no option to boot to desktop, where I operate, adds another level of irritation.

That is not to say my desktop is cluttered. Far from it. I run folders and sub folders for organization of everything I use to keep clutter down. I even run Taskbar Tweaker so that I can separate programs so that I can organize my taskbar in the exact order I want to run my programs.

For my twopenneths worth I really don't mind the start screen once its been decluttered (just the same with my old start menu). I don't use any metro apps, main complaint is ads.My main issue with win8 is having two sets of settings in different places, one via charms and the usual suspects in the control panel. I would much prefer all of it to be in the control panel.

as an aside my most used keyboard shortcut next to win-e is win-x which gives you instant access to an system admin tools type menu.

By the way, why cant you re-size tiles for non metro apps? Why doesn't a right click let you kill a metro app?

Right-clicking doesn't let you close the app because Microsoft is managing the resources for it. It's like a phone. You don't need to close apps manually in most cases. The OS is smarter about resource management. I'd imagine that in most cases a big "x" on right click isn't possible because right-click is also the same as swiping up from the bottom for tablets. Just like phone and tablet apps, it's too easy to hit accidentally. If you want to close a metro app manually, just move the mouse to the top, click and drag the program to the bottom. In most cases though, the system is going to close background programs as resources demand. It's an unnecessary thing for most people, even if we're used to it on desktops.

From the Start Screen swipe your mouse to the left edge. Right click on the icon of the running Metro App. The only option is Close. No idea where the original poster was right-clicking to try and close it (the tile I guess).

So yes, Win 8 manages the resources and will close them for you, but it's pitifully easy to close them manually if you want/need to.

To close an metro/modern app, simple take your mouse pointer to the top of your screen and it will turn into a hand. Left-click and move your mouse to the bottom of the screen and the app will shrink and close.

To close a metro app with touch, simple place your finger above your screens margins, slowly drag your finger gently downward. The app will "catch" onto your finger and you can drag it downward to the bottom of your screen to close it.

If you want to have two apps open on the screen at one time, start with your mouse of finger at the top of the screen as if you were going to close the app, but instead of dragging or pulling it to the bottom of the screen, move your finger to the right or left of your screen once the apps "catches" and it will be transitioned to the side.

At this point you can return to the Start Screen and open your second app and it will take up approx. 3/4 of the screen. Swap apps by dragging the common app edge to the center of the screen to use full screen or change the one apps from narrow to mid size screen.

[quote="windywoo"I only use Metro apps as experiments but once you work out the hot corners, multitasking becomes simple, if only for the case where the user needs only a few apps at a time. So far the apps have been a very mixed bag. There are some ones that work very well like EBay or Netflix. Others seem just to be layouts for familiar sites like Facebook. I've always felt that apps are mostly a con though. Instead of using the web, people are tricked into thinking they need apps to do things, locking them in to expensive hardware or contracts.[/quote]

Agreed, the apps are a completely mixed bag. I looked for a sports app to replace the default Bing app. The Sports Illustrated app was beyond awful (I'd rather go to the web site than bother with it). The ESPN app (not a site I normally frequent) is pretty awesome with all kinds of customizations for teams and sports you want to follow, get alerts on etc. It's like night and day. I shiver at the thought of actually paying for an app given the disparity in quality of the free ones I've seen so far.

Many thanks for the reviews. Being told not to update to Windows 8 and miss out on its core updates and fundamental OS improvements because of an arbitrary Ui change is very disheartening. It is good to see that there are reasonable options available to bring back functionality while still gaining the improvements behind Windows 8. I will more strongly consider an upgrade with these options.

Honestly, it's just not as bad as people are making it out to be.

Remember the Start Button? Place your cursor there, then just move a few more pixels to the corner. See the button pop up? Click it. Voila, Start Screen!

I upgraded just a few days ago in spite of all the hoopla and I find it very easy to use after just a few hours of playing around with it. Start by just using the Start Screen as a replacement Start Menu, then slowly delve into the Metro type stuff. Learn the swiping moves on the left hand side of the screen to quickly change between apps (again, much easier with a mouse than people make it out to be, I have no touch screen) and suddenly all the weirdness is gone and you realize that the Start Screen actually IS the Start Menu in a full-page format. It becomes second-nature very quickly.

As for the article, it's not at all surprising that one developer says all the guts of the Start Menu are still there. Just hit win + x from the desktop (I think MS calls it the 'Power User Menu'.) Look familiar?

I use the start menu very rarely. My primary use is for system tools. I run almost everything else off the desktop. I like my start menu small and uncluttered. By definition the Star Screen violates the very essence of how I use the Start Menu. And by booting into the Star Screen with no option to boot to desktop, where I operate, adds another level of irritation.

That is not to say my desktop is cluttered. Far from it. I run folders and sub folders for organization of everything I use to keep clutter down. I even run Taskbar Tweaker so that I can separate programs so that I can organize my taskbar in the exact order I want to run my programs.

If you just use it for system tools then try than WIN+X key combo. Most of the system tools are right there, no Start Menu needed.

I like Pokki because it allows me to bypass the horrid "Start" menu all together. I don't think I would even miss the "Start" button very much if Windows simply allowed me to boot straight into desktop mode. I couldn't believe this functionality was taken out of Windows 8.

The Metro interface seems like it would be good for tablets or the new generation of touch-screen enabled laptops but for a traditional system there are some minor irritations that ultimately make me wish I just was running Windows 7 to begin with.

Are you referring to closing an app running on Windows Phone 8? It's super simple to do and was introduced along with Windows Phone 7.5 a full uear ago.

Hold down the back button to bring up your background apps. Select the app you wish to close. press the back button until you exit the app. When you long press the back button that app will no longer be running and will not included in your background tasks.

this is basic stuff that I wish people would take the time to learn and not continue to repeat over and over again how Windows Phone "can't do xyz" when the fact is, there are many advanced features in Windows Phone and now even more in Windows Phone 8 that users just don't know about because they know how to do it on Android or iPhone, the fact is, these features are there and only for the advanced user, which you and many other are not -- not yet anyway.

I don't find that mechanism even remotely intuitive and I feel like calling it 'basic' is not really accurate. I also don't necessarily want to be required to re-open the app and 'back out' of it to shut it down. That said I can't recall *needing* this capability, but this is the first I've heard of it either way and I hope a more direct mechanism shows up in the future.

EDIT: To note I am a Microsoft employee and have had a Windows Phone since the initial launch. So as a >2yr user of the platform this falls firmly in the 'TIL' category.

Not really sufficient. That might move the screen if it's open, but it's still just a Band-Aid over the real problem: Windows remembers the last display that whatever Metro app you had open was on. Next time you hit the Windows key, the Start Screen pops up on that display. A simple option that tells Windows "Always open the Start Screen on display #1" would make things so much less irritating whenever you open Start.

The problem, primarily, is that the new UI is different for the sake of being on a tablet, not necessarily better.

The new start screen does the same thing as before, only better as it can show more apps on one screen without having to navigate the dropdown menu tree in W7. (You just need to learn to pin things to the start screen.) Power users who like to use keyboard shortcuts are also better off with W8 because they have matched or improved number of keystrokes required compared to W7. In short, launching apps is FASTER with the new UI. It's not just different.

I get that some people don't like changes. But let's not make it sound like the new UI is inherently counter productive. It's not.

I have, literally, ...you know, I should check. Let me check. Yeah, 671 programs installed. Roughly 200 of which I launch regularly. How does the Modern interface show that? How *could* it show that? A Tablet-centric interface can't be expected to scale well in that manner, it's not how Tablets are used.

The problem isn't that the Modern interface is a bad interface. IMHO, it's a good, borderline great interface. For some people. On some devices. Some of the time. For many others, it's suboptimal. For many others, they don't want to learn how to use it. I'm sure in many cases, both.

Look, I don't know if the Start Menu has support for displaying 200 apps/programs, but it seems to me that you could easily build groups of apps on the Start Menu and quickly access them that way.

It's not likely that all you apps are unique in function and could not be grouped? Like Office apps, Communications Apps, Utilities, etc.

It seems like that would be a much easier way to access over 200 apps which you use each day, rather than drilling down through an endless nest of All Programs as we have been doing since Windows 95!?

BTW: I find it difficult to believe that you regularly access 200 apps using the Windows 95/Windows 7 Start Menu. It seems highly improbable that you actually drill down menu after menu, column of apps after column of apps to press the icon to run one of your 672 programs.

I find it much more efficient to go to the Start Menu, select Search or Run and typing in your app name and running it than how you claim to be starting your 200+ apps.

Either way, The Start Screen in Windows 8 would be easier and more efficient for you to accomplish running the number of apps you state that you have vs the old Windows 95/7 way of running apps.

The overall sentiment from the pro-Window 8 (or indifferent) crowd seems to be that the average user does not need a hierarchical start menu. I agree wholeheartedly. The average user may only use 6-10 different applications ever, if even that many. I agree that the superbar or even Start Screen are just fine for that kind of user.

However, developers and administrators still need a start menu. Case in point, Microsoft SQL Server 2012.

Someone at MS must have forgotten to give the SQL Server team the memo about Windows 8 and Server 2012, because SQL Server 2012 installs about 20 shortcuts to the start menu, in a hierarchical set of folders, and not every shortcut contains the phrase "SQL Server" or even "SQL" (meaning they cannot be easily searched for.)

On the Start Menu (my screenshot is from SQL Server 2008 R2, but 2012 has the same hierarchy):

On the Start Screen:

Note the context-dependent names such as "Execute Package Utility" and "Deployment Wizard". If I search for "SQL", those shortcuts will not be found. Also, some of the 2nd-level folder names are meaningful, such as "Integration Services" and "Analysis Services". Too bad the Metro-style Start Screen's All Apps view will not show them, as it hides all folders deeper than the top level (i.e. all shortcuts under "Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2" will appear in a flat list.)

It's great for Microsoft to say (ever since Vista) that every start menu/screen shortcut should have a meaningful name so it's searchable and doesn't rely on the user hunting through a hierarchy of folders, but as usual, MS cannot even practice what it preaches.

So please, before you flame the anti-Windows 8 crowd for being luddites who are simply afraid of change, consider that Microsoft's own software does not even follow the best practice guidelines for creating shortcuts that are useful in the Metro-style Start Screen. It does not even follow best practices for Vista (i.e. make each shortcut name meaningful on its own, to facilitate searching). Vista was released in 2007.

Oh, and consider what the Metro Start Screen would look like for a developer who needs to install more than one version of SQL Server (i.e. for testing purposes.)

And the "Power User Menu" is not the menu I am looking for. Half those tools should already exist in the Start Menu, and I access the other tools through their home locations to begin with.

That's completely nonsensical. You're given a menu that contains exactly all of the system tools you could possibly want, and your only issue with it is that it isn't the start menu? What's the difference as long as they're easy to reach, which they are?

Mouse navigation is more comfortable to me. Keyboard shortcuts are for when I have a users computer remoted and I want to get them off the phone as quickly as possible.

If you prefer mouse navigation, then just move the mouse cursor into the bottom left corner and right click, and the same menu will come up.

Or I can left click on the Start button that shouldn't have disappeared.And the "Power User Menu" is not the menu I am looking for. Half those tools should already exist in the Start Menu, and I access the other tools through their home locations to begin with.

So what functionality are you looking for? What are you trying to accomplish that can't be done that way, or with win+search?

At some point, complaints can become so ridiculously reductionist that they're covered by the "it doesn't work the exact same way it used to work and therefore I hate it" camp. Those are still valid complaints to some degree, but they lose a lot of credibility, in my mind.

So what are you trying to accomplish? That's the real question. Windows 8 might have a different way of doing it. Maybe it's faster, maybe not. But unless you tell us what specific functionality you're looking for, those of us who know it well enough to pass out tips can't help you.

The overall sentiment from the pro-Window 8 (or indifferent) crowd seems to be that the average user does not need a hierarchical start menu. I agree wholeheartedly. The average user may only use 6-10 different applications ever, if even that many. I agree that the superbar or even Start Screen are just fine for that kind of user.

However, developers and administrators still need a start menu. Case in point, Microsoft SQL Server 2012....

Agreed. But again, the question is whether Microsoft is better served focusing on fixing issues for developers...or the vast, vast majority of people who are NOT developers? Again, this is the difference between criticisms that are "its' bad for me" and those that are "it's just plain bad". Too many people conflate the two.

Incidentally, for VS 12, I did this: Right click on the taskbar. Select Toolbars-> New Toolbar. In the Window that just popped up, click at the type and copy and paste %appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs\<<Visual Studios 2012>> into the address. Hit enter. Hit select folder.

Note, the <<>> is because I'm away from my Win 8 box and forgot the exact start menu directory. Just navigate to the VS folder once you get to the %appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\Start Menu\Programs folder This creates a pop-up toolbar for all VS programs on the taskbar. You can also just take out the folder name, and you'd have a full folder list exactly like the old start menu.

The overall sentiment from the pro-Window 8 (or indifferent) crowd seems to be that the average user does not need a hierarchical start menu. I agree wholeheartedly. The average user may only use 6-10 different applications ever, if even that many. I agree that the superbar or even Start Screen are just fine for that kind of user.

However, developers and administrators still need a start menu. Case in point, Microsoft SQL Server 2012.

Someone at MS must have forgotten to give the SQL Server team the memo about Windows 8 and Server 2012, because SQL Server 2012 installs about 20 shortcuts to the start menu, in a hierarchical set of folders, and not every shortcut contains the phrase "SQL Server" or even "SQL" (meaning they cannot be easily searched for.)

On the Start Menu (my screenshot is from SQL Server 2008 R2, but 2012 has the same hierarchy):

On the Start Screen:

Note the context-free names such as "Execute Package Utility" and "Deployment Wizard". If I search for "SQL", those shortcuts will not be found. Also, some of the 2nd-level folder names are meaningful, such as "Integration Services" and "Analysis Services". Too bad the Metro-style Start Screen's All Apps view will not show them, as it hides all folders deeper than the top level (i.e. all shortcuts under "Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2" will appear in a flat list.)

It's great for Microsoft to say (ever since Vista) that every start menu/screen shortcut should have a meaningful name so it's searchable and doesn't rely on the user hunting through a hierarchy of folders, but as usual, MS cannot even practice what it preaches.

So please, before you flame the anti-Windows 8 crowd for being luddites who are simply afraid of change, consider that Microsoft's own software does not even follow the best practice guidelines for creating shortcuts that are useful in the Metro-style Start Screen. It does not even follow best practices for Vista (i.e. make each shortcut name meaningful on its own, to facilitate searching). Vista was released in 2007.

It's very evident that you want to go out of your way to show how Windows 8 Start Screen and Metro do not work for you.

Thank you for including a snapshot of your Start Screen, because it looks like you haven't learned how to group similar apps together, for example, all your SQL programs together and separate from your Control Panel and Browser.

It might also help if you created a Title for your group(s). How about creating a Title of SQL, and Utilities, etc? It sounds simple and maybe stupid, but labeling your groups goes a long way to enjoying and organizing your Start Screen.

Maybe your not a luddite, but I bet if you put a little time into organizing your Start Screen with groups and named those groups then you would enjoy Windows 8 more than you do now.